Shane Burley and Ben Lorber’s new book, “Safety Through Solidarity: A Radical Guide to Fighting Antisemitism,” is well timed. A documented increase in antisemitic attacks and harassment since Donald Trump’s 2016 election has been compounded and confused by widespread allegations of antisemitism since Hamas’ attack last October, creating an environment in which people are arguing about what is and what isn’t antisemitic. This book brings great clarity to these debates. Well-researched and sourced, thoughtful and nuanced, “Safety Through Solidarity” is an essential guide for our times.
Burley and Lorber trace the history of how the Jewish people have been scapegoated and reified as a diversion by ruling elites who’ve conjured images of Jews to draw attention away from actual sources of power. They show the origins of antisemitism resting with Christians who, in the pagan Roman Empire, were in competition with Jews, and the development through the medieval period, when Christianity became hegemonic. Subsequently, antisemitism became “woven into the ideological fabric of Western civilization, utilized by generations of reactionary movements to fortify social hierarchies and manage the tensions of global capitalism.”
